Willem van Aelst

Dutch, 1627 - 1683

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Two roosters, a rabbit, and three small birds hang from the top of this vertical still life painting, so the heads of one white rooster and the rabbit come to rest on a dark stone ledge, about a third of the way up the composition. To our left, the tawny-brown rabbit’s nose faces us as the head rests on an azure-blue purse with silver lining. A pair of scissors is tucked behind the strap, which falls down over the ledge. To our right, the head of the rooster curves away with its red coxcomb coming toward us. A black fly rests on the rooster’s comb. The black tail feathers of another rooster arc out behind it, near the upper right corner of the painting. In front of the rabbit's bound, hind legs is a small bird with puffed, silvery-gray feathers, and one black leg tied up with a dark cord. To our left are two more small birds, one with gray, cream, and tan feathers, the other with cream, golden orange, and lapis blue. These two are secured with their beaks pointing upward. Two white and scarlet-red caps, falcon’s hoods, are strung up by white ribbon near the pair of birds. Below the ledge is a carved scene with nude or nearly nude people, but this area is mostly in shadow. Behind the animals is a dark, nearly black wall.
Willem van Aelst, Still Life with Dead Game, 1661, oil on canvas, Pepita Milmore Memorial Fund, 1982.36.1

Still Life with Dead Game

Willem van Aelst · 1661 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1982.36.1

Bibliography

1753

  • Houbraken, Arnold. De Groote Schouburgh der Nederlantsche Konstschilders en Schilderessen. 3 vols. in 1. The Hague, 1753 (Reprint: Amsterdam, 1976): 1:228-230, 358.

1946

  • Swillens, P.T.A. "R.K. Kunstenaars in de 17de Eeuw." Katholiek Cultureel Tijdschrift (15 January 1946):416-419.

1956

  • Bergström, Ingvar. Dutch Still-Life Painting in the Seventeenth Century. Translated by Christina Hedström and Gerald Taylor. London, 1956: 220-224.

1969

  • Bol, Laurens J. Holländische Maler des 17. Jahrhunderts nahe den Grossen Meister. Landschaft und Stilleben. Braunschweig, 1969: 324-327.

1982

  • Montias, John Michael. Artists and Artisans in Delft: A Socio-Economic Study of the Seventeenth Century. Princeton, 1982.

1984

  • Sullivan, Scott A. The Dutch Gamepiece. Montclair, N.J., 1984, 51-56, 70-72, 97.

1995

  • Wheelock, Arthur K., Jr. Dutch Paintings of the Seventeenth Century. The Collections of the National Gallery of Art Systematic Catalogue. Washington, D.C., 1995: 3.

2008

  • Paul, Tanya. “‘Beschildert Met Een Glans’: Willem van Aelst and Artistic Self-Consciousness in Seventeenth-Century Dutch Still Life Painting.” Ph.D. dissertation, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, 2008: 64-82.